Deceivingly Beautiful Creatures between Truth and Imagination The Romanian-German artist Miron Schmuckle is a singular position within contemporary art. Growing up in Romania under Nicolae Ceausescu, he dreamed of other worlds that seemed forever inaccessible due to the Iron Curtain. From the beginning, Schmuckle's uniquely coherent pictorial cosmos has been linked to the idea of primeval forests and jungles, oscillating between hyperrealism and undisguised escapism, precise observation of nature and exuberant imagination. His almost scientific approach belies the fact that his complex creations have not sprung from nature but from imagination. Schmuckle's fascinating hybrid creatures intertwine notions of scent and poison, beauty and transience, anatomy and sexuality to create an oeuvre between truth and invention that is both timeless and ostensibly fallen out of time. This monograph comprises works from the past 15 years and gives insights into the artist's concepts and technique through an in-depth interview with art scholar and journalist Simon Elson.